EMC Test Equipment

HV TECHNOLOGIES is a premier EMC Equipment provider for both the public and private sectors. We offer EMC test solutions for a variety of different applications. Discover why our equipment is the best in the market. If you know your EMC test setups, go straight to the end of this note for our EMC test equipment offerings:

Conducted Immunity Testing (CIT) provides metrics for any electrical machine that has external cables. Any conductor outside the shielded enclosure of the machine is an unintended radiator, both inside and outside the enclosure. The CIT test provides a measure of how much energy is conducted into the device when RF energy is incident on the cable. Test wavelengths are kept small relative to the Unit Under Test (UUT) to minimize losses due to incident radio energy traveling along the ‘enclosure antenna’. The instrument measures energy conducted onto the cables and into the UUT then calculates immunity to the conducted signal.

Radiated Immunity Testing is designed to test the UUT to a specified intensity of RF signal spread across a fairly wide frequency spectrum. The idea is to check the equipment under test operates in a broadband RF noise environment, allowing confidence that real signal sources from cell phones, relays and motors operated close to the equipment don’t cause interference or faulty operation. Typical industrial test signals check amplitudes of 10V/m at a frequency range of 80MHz to 1GHz. Compliance with standards in the aviation and automotive sectors requires immunity to substantially higher amplitude and frequency ranges.

The workhorse of any EMC test laboratory is the EMC Power Amplifier. The amplifier provides the EM test signal being applied to the Unit Under Test, dictating signal fidelity and defining the noise floor. There is no doubt that the EMC Amp is where most money and the most thought should be spent when initially equipping the lab. While it is very true you should only buy the functions you need, it’s also important to avoid having to move different amplifiers into the test chamber for different functions. Carefully examine what functions are required now and in future and set your sights on the best performing EMC amplifier your budget allows.
It is very useful to have expertise close on hand who can guide and advise you based on your specific EMC amplifier needs. Contact details of our specialists are shown at the bottom of this article

Most of us don’t mind be beaten “smart” but hate it when the most basic element of the high tech system we’ve just developed bites us. My own brush with the not so simple EMC Antenna is full of the usual suspects and all the stuff I know I should know. BUT, if you don’t want to be standing on one leg, antenna in hand asking your intern the EMC equivalent of “Can you hear me now?” it is truly worth spending as much time as possible getting to know your antenna. In my own case, we lost a couple of days because our device was failing pre-certification tests by about -2dB. We adjusted everything we could, tried over and over with new conditions and were about to declare a bust when someone suggested we change our “neutral” wooden table out for a plastic one. We gained 3dB in an instant and I have never used a wooden table in a test chamber again!

Understand your antenna and the resulting compromises you may inadvertently make in your RF signal’s forward or return path.

So far the discussion has been on commercial EMC equipment, concentrating on EMC test gear These likely offer test capabilities up to CISPR standards, or perhaps some medical certifications covered by IEC60601-1-2. Avionics EMC Test Equipment, however, requires much higher signal strengths to be broadcast over substantially wider bandwidths, adding a new dimension to the level of difficulty faced by the lab to test to pre-compliance. Labs looking to equip to handle Avionics EMC requirements need to ensure the test equipment complies with Mil-Std 461 for general compliance, and Mil-Std 704 specifically for avionics. For our NATO partners, DEF STAN 59/411 is very common.

HV Technologies has partnered with Pontis EMC to provide a best in class EMC shielded audio and video camera with shielded distribution for those times when it is imperative to see the UUT as it undergoes tests in the chamber. The shields employed enable CISPR 25 -5 certification.

Don’t forget the heavy loaders! If you have experience balancing an expensive antenna on a wobbly table you’ll know the dangers. We partnered with Innco Systems to provide the final link in the EMC chain. Innco produces high-quality mechanical systems and maintains minimal RF absorption. Systems can be purchased for many off the shelf applications and can also be software customized to your exact requirements in our facility